Can Coco—or Aryna—Win This Year’s French Open? Your 2026 Preview

Reported by Vogue.

The women's draw at this year's French Open is wide open — and honestly, that makes it more interesting than if one player were steamrolling the rest. According to Vogue, none of the top four seeds — world number-one Aryna Sabalenka, number-two Elena Rybakina, three-time champion Iga Swiatek, or defending champion Coco Gauff — won a title during the clay warm-up season in Madrid or Rome. No coronation in the lead-up means no predetermined ending in Paris.

Gauff enters Roland Garros with the most compelling argument for a repeat: she won last year's title by outlasting Sabalenka in three brutal sets, and her resilience under pressure is genuinely elite. Sabalenka, though, looks ravenous — she's been cutting through competition with a focus that suggests she's done being the runner-up at her missing major. A potential semifinal between the two could be the match of the tournament. Swiatek is trickier to read. Four French Open titles say she belongs here, but a possible third-round collision with Jelena Ostapenko — who leads their head-to-head 6-0 and lives for chaos — could derail her before the second week even begins. Rybakina already has the Australian Open this year, but she's never cleared the quarterfinals at Roland Garros.

Outside the top four, watch Elina Svitolina (Madrid champion), Marta Kostyuk (Rome champion), and the combustible Mirra Andreeva, who has all the talent and just enough unpredictability to make any draw nervous. Kostyuk's opening-round win came with a gut-punch context: she had learned moments before stepping onto the court that her family home in Kyiv was struck within 100 meters by a Russian missile. Her tearful post-match speech was a reminder that some of these players are carrying weight that has nothing to do with tennis.

On the Men's Side, Sinner Might Just Walk Away With It

The men's story is almost entirely about who isn't there. Carlos Alcaraz — two-time defending champion and the reason last year's final ran five and a half hours, the longest in tournament history — withdrew with a right-wrist injury and has since confirmed he'll skip Wimbledon too. France's Arthur Fils, Jack Draper, Lorenzo Musetti, and Holger Rune are also out. With Alcaraz gone, world number-one Jannik Sinner arrives on an 11-match winning streak and a career Grand Slam within reach. Second seed Alexander Zverev is the most realistic obstacle; Novak Djokovic, with five Paris titles across his 24 Grand Slams, remains a threat when fortune cooperates. The American men's chances took an early hit when seventh seed Taylor Fritz — still shaking off rust from a knee injury — lost in four sets to 21-year-old wild card Nishesh Basavareddy, ranked 148th in the world, in the very first round.

When every top seed skips a clay warm-up win and the defending men's champion is home nursing his wrist, the only certainty at Roland Garros this year is that nothing is certain — and that's exactly when the tournament gets worth watching.

Read the original at Vogue.